According to a new report from Hamburg-based secondary market research company yStats.com, B2C E-Commerce sales in Eastern Europe have a high growth potential due to currently accounting for only a small share of overall retail market. The publication, titled “Eastern Europe B2C E-Commerce Market 2018” contains key online shopping statistics and trends in five major emerging markets in this region.
Eastern Europe’s online retail sales projected to rise in 2018
Eastern Europe has one of the smallest online retail markets among the global regions in 2017, but is projected to see growth through 2018 and beyond. Currently accounting for less than 5% of the region’s overall retail sales, B2C E-Commerce revenues in Eastern Europe are spurred by market trends such as M-Commerce, social and cross-border online shopping, as yStats.com’s report shows.
Cross-border online shopping trend spreads across the region
Of the three top economies of the region, only Poland managed to reach past the 5% threshold in terms of E-Commerce’s share of retail sales in 2017. Still, even in this nation the Internet and online shopper penetration rates are below the EU averages, indicating further untapped potential. In Russia, B2C E-Commerce sales are the largest of all Eastern European nations in 2018, but an increasing share of these is going to foreign online merchants, most of all Chinese, according to data cited in the yStats.com report. In the Czech Republic, Poland and Ukraine the awareness of China-based AliExpress is also growing, although unlike in Russia, local E-Commerce competitors in these three countries continue to top AliExpress in website popularity.
Mobile and social shopping on the Internet to drive the further growth
Market evidence from Turkey highlights two other major trends in Eastern Europe’s B2C E-Commerce. These include mobile and social commerce. More than 50% of online shoppers in this country make purchases through smartphones and close to that number also place orders through social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.
